Lula begins, this Tuesday, April 11, 2023, an official visit to China, until April 14. The trip was scheduled for the end of March, but the Brazilian president had to postpone his trip because of pneumonia.
Former far-right president Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2022) repeated that China was in the process of to buy Brazil » and had multiplied anti-Chinese statements, especially during his election campaign. Lula, back in power since January 1, is therefore seeking to break with these hostile speeches and to break the diplomatic isolation of his country, to position Brazil as a leading leader on a world scale.
“ Brazil continues to insist on a place on the UN Security Council, although it has little chance of obtaining it. », underlines the geographer Hervé Théry, professor at the University of Sao Paulo. “ This is part of an attempt to assert itself somewhat in between: Brazil sometimes tries to join the club of the big boys, for example by applying for the OECD, and sometimes to pose as the leader of what we used to call the Third World. » Brazil is thus also trying to relaunch the Bricksthis heterogeneous club of large developing countries, which brings together Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
Mediation in Ukraine
In this diplomatic strategy, Lula is also trying to position himself as a mediator in the war in Ukraine. Under his first two terms, between 2003 and 2010, Brasilia had already played the intermediary in the Iranian nuclear file. Today, the country has an ambiguous position on the war in Ukraine. On the one hand, Lula says Russia cannot seize territory from Ukraine, but on the other, the Brazilian president suggested last week that Ukraine could cede Crimea to Russia. Moreover, Brazil is not participating in the sanctions against Moscow.
During his visit to China, Lula intends to present his mediation plan for peace in Ukraine to his counterpart Xi Jinping. For Frederic Louault , professor of political science at the Free University of Brussels (ULB), this is part of an old diplomatic tradition in Brazil. “ Lula, during his first terms, had established good relations with Russia, without completely turning his back on the United States, the European Union and the Western bloc
“, he explains. “ Brazil has an intermediary position that can bring together around the same table different actors who are firmly opposed to each other “, continues the researcher, who recognizes that the country “ alone cannot assume such an ambition “. This is also why Brazil needs to propose a solution articulated with other powers, particularly China. If it works, and a “ Sino-Brazilian common position could allow to put at the same table the different actors of the conflict
“, Brasilia could grow out of it on the international scene, still believes Frédéric Louault.
Break free from the dollar
China is Brazil’s largest trading partner, so the economy is an important part of Lula’s visit to China. The Chinese market represents more than a third of Brazilian exports, three times more than the United States. Brazil is one of the few countries that sells more to China than it buys, thanks in particular to soybeans or Brazilian beef.
► To read also: With or without Lula, the Brazilian agribusiness to attack China According to the economist Mylène Gaulard, lecturer at the University of Grenoble, Brazil could join the “ new silk roads
», this gigantic Chinese investment project in transport infrastructure. The two countries could also agree on semiconductors, these essential elements for the manufacture of electronic chips, but whose exports to China have been severely restricted by the United States since October 2022. ” China’s goal is to become independent of American semiconductors and produce them both at home and abroad. “, she explains. “ China negotiates to be able to install Chinese semiconductor factories on Brazilian soil
“, further specifies Mylène Gaulard.
Finally, China and Brazil announced at the end of March the signing of a major agreement to exchange between them in reais and yuan, ie to do without the dollar. A snub to the United States, but also a way of countering the volatility of the dollar since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, explains the economist, and of avoiding monetary transaction costs in bilateral exchanges between the China and Brazil. Frederic Louault,